A Brief(case) History of the Invisible Man

            In one of the very first chapters of Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison, our narrator attends a strange event and then receives a briefcase as a gift. He is taken to an event called the Battle Royal for the entertainment of white people where he is forced into violent fights with other Black boys and then he gives a speech at the end. Everyone laughs at him and thinks his speech is funny, but nevertheless, at the end of it, he is given a fancy new briefcase as a gift for giving his speech. He may not know it at the time, but this briefcase starts a new era and story for him.

            After the narrator is sent to the North, he begins his adventures and new life in NYC with his briefcase, carrying only the letters from Bledsoe. He says, “many of the men carried dispatch cases and briefcases and I gripped mine with a sense of importance,” (164). As he walks around the new city speaking with potential employers, he feels confident with his business-like briefcase. His briefcase is yet again with him when he sadly finds out what Bledsoe had actually written on the letters. For a good portion of the book he then goes through quite a tumultuous time: working for liberty paints, getting in an accident, experiencing a lobotomy, and living with a woman named Mary, all without mention of the briefcase – but fear not, it soon makes a comeback. He experiences a huge moment in the change towards a new life for him: meeting Brother Jack and being introduced to the brotherhood, and almost immediately the briefcase makes a reappearance. After smashing an extremely racist caricature coin bank and having no place to put the pieces, he decides to put them in his briefcase and carry on with his life. After trying to dispose of it, it is immediately returned to him, and he’s forced to put it back in his briefcase – unable to escape the symbol of racism.

            We continue to see him carry out through his adventures, always with the briefcase at his side. As he collects various things that are representative of his life and experiences, he continues to put them all into the briefcase. The paper with his new name on it, brotherhood materials, a leg chain from one of the Brothers, a threatening note, and Clifton’s Sambo dolls. After one incident where he’s on the run and gets a bit injured, he momentarily is without his briefcase and the panic he displays before it’s returned shows how important it is to him. For a while though, he went about things, continuing to add to his collection of things without really thinking about the meaning, but when he really thinks about it, he realizes how significant it is. Near the end of the novel, the narrator falls into a manhole and is left stuck in the dark, with nothing but his little briefcase portfolio of his life. He then has to burn the things for light which has its own added symbolism.

            The whole idea of him carrying around a container of important tokens from various things he has experienced is very interesting to me. I think it represents the baggage he carries around everywhere, even if subconsciously, and how hard it is to get rid of different parts of it. The symbols of his identity are easily quickly destroyed and forgotten, whereas he can’t seem to rid himself of the racist symbols. Overall this was one of the most intriguing ideas to me in Invisible Man. 

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